


zephyr

by highqualityidiot



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-03
Updated: 2015-10-03
Packaged: 2018-04-24 15:12:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4924453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/highqualityidiot/pseuds/highqualityidiot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chanyeol notices that he and his neighbor like to listen to same kind of music and starts wondering who's the person living above him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	zephyr

There are times when Chanyeol just lies on his bed or down on the floor, his laptop beside him blaring his favorite music, volume to the max. He is nice, so he tries to do that during the daytime to disturb as few neighbors as possible and also when his roommate is not home (he and Sehun are a perfect match in every way except in their taste in music). He likes to fill the silence with loud and obnoxious rock, likes to just stare at the ceiling or the walls and let the melodies and lyrics wash over him. It relaxes him, eases the stress over school and his future and life in general.

For some reason, every year around the end of summer, Chanyeol always finds himself going back to listening to his old favorite albums from high school times. He doesn’t know why but there’s always something about the season that makes him feel nostalgic and want to hear those old favorites that he still knows all the lyrics to and can still play on guitar years later. And this year, too, when August is slowly ending and September rolling around, Chanyeol’s daily playlists are suddenly full of his old favorites from Muse, Green Day and Red Hot Chili Peppers, among others. 

This year, though, his very own nostalgia sessions get a new kind of dimension when he realizes that his neighbor likes to listen to similar kind of music. It’s not once or twice when Chanyeol can hear familiar tunes coming from the room right above his. And to make it even odder (or better?) his neighbor seems to like many same songs as Chanyeol himself, judging from how many times they seem to loop them (just like Chanyeol). This makes Chanyeol curious, makes him wonder what kind of a person lives upstairs and whether they, too, like to lie around and drown their stress and worries into vibrant rock melodies. They at least seem more unconcerned about the noise and disturbing neighbors since some days Chanyeol can hear the thumping music all the way until midnight, when he’s already either turned the volume down or plucked in his earphones. He doesn’t mind but he wonders about other neighbors; he’s sometimes gotten complaints of playing piano or guitar too loud for too long.

 

On one slow Wednesday forenoon Chanyeol is loitering at home because he has no lectures that day and only evening shift at work. He lifts his laptop on the bed beside him and puts on Red Hot Chili Peppers, clicking the volume up again because he’s pretty sure that every neighbor and their mom are out at this time of the day. Except one, it seems. One and half songs later Chanyeol can hear the familiar, echoing thump of music through his ceiling. He glances up and smiles a bit to himself. He knows it’s stupid but the music his neighbor plays almost feels like a greeting. Chanyeol lies down, crossing his arms behind his head and stares at the ceiling.

He starts wondering again. Maybe the neighbor is a student like him, because they’re home at such a random time. Or maybe they’re unemployed. Or a freelance designer who works at home. Chanyeol is kind of bursting with curiosity, he’s been trying to imagine the mysterious neighbor who likes to blare _Chanyeol’s old favorite music_ the same way as him. Nowadays his stomach flips a little every time he runs into people in the stairway when he’s coming or going, automatically wondering whether they’re the one who lives above him. Chanyeol doesn’t see his neighbors that often and definitely doesn’t know all of them so it’s possible that he’s never even seen the mysterious neighbor. But now he kind of wants to. His curiosity is killing him. Sometimes he thinks of going and slipping a paper under the neighbor’s door or into their mailbox and asking which songs are their favorites and why. He also wonders whether the person living upstairs actually listens to his music, too, and finds it equally funny that their tastes are so similar. He wonders a lot.

For some reason Chanyeol feels kind of restless right then, so he pushes himself up and goes to grab his guitar on a whim. He hasn’t played for a while but listening to the RHCP classics make his fingers itch, and he sits back on the bed, the guitar in his lap and pauses the music. He crouches over the guitar and starts plucking the strings, digging up the right chords from the back of his memory. With some songs, his fingers move almost on their own, the muscle memory still there from high school when they used to cover Red Hot Chili Peppers songs with their band. He lazily plucks through a couple of songs he can still remember, so absorbed in playing that he doesn’t even realize that the music upstairs has stopped, nor does he hear Sehun coming home until his roommate sharply knocks on his doorframe and asks him to cut it out because Sehun has a huge exam tomorrow and needs to study and wants silence, thankyouverymuch. Chanyeol gives his roommate a nod and a bit reluctantly puts down his guitar and grabs his earphones instead.

 

On a Sunday morning that week, Chanyeol is somehow up before noon, lying on his bed and again plucking his guitar; he hasn’t been able to put it away since Wednesday, much to Sehun’s annoyance. He’s been rediscovering their band’s old cover songs and trying out some new stuff, too, and he just feels like he could play and play all the time. 

On his way to kitchen to get some juice, Chanyeol happens to notice a folded piece of paper on the floor by the front door. He goes and picks it up, thinking it’s something Sehun has dropped but is surprised when he unfolds the paper. 

_A request for the guitarist. I think I heard you playing bits of RHCP’s The Zephyr Song the other day, could you maybe play it again?_

The handwriting’s a bit messy but readable and Chanyeol can only stare at the paper for a moment while his mind tries to fit all the pieces together. His first thought is that the message _must_ be from the neighbor upstairs, it can’t be anyone else. They heard his playing? And they want to hear more so they must’ve liked it even a little. Chanyeol finds his heart pounding and hands shaking slightly as he retreats back to his room.

His guitar rests on the bed, beside a bundle of blankets and his laptop. Chanyeol reads the short message over and over, still completely incredulous. He’s indeed been playing _The Zephyr Song_ , it was one of the covers they used to do in high school, and it’s a song that Chanyeol really likes to play. 

_Could you maybe play it again?_ Chanyeol can’t help a flip in his stomach as he reads the words again; it’s been so long since someone specially asked him to play anything. But when should he play? Is the neighbor home right now? Could they be sitting upstairs, waiting? Chanyeol doesn’t know but decides to give it a try, and he can always play it again later.

Chanyeol drops the paper on his bed and picks up his guitar in turn. He walks to open the window and sits down by it. He searches the lyrics online just in case, plucks the strings a couple of times to check the tune and flexes his fingers. His heart is still pounding weirdly fast and he can feel nervousness twisting his stomach. He takes a couple of deep breaths and then starts playing. 

Chanyeol’s voice comes out a bit rough with the lack of practice lately, and he can’t keep up with all the lyrics but he plays on, trying to make up the slight flaws with the energetic rendition and powerful choruses. When Chanyeol plucks the last, fading chords that escape out of the window to the sunny morning, he feels weirdly accomplished, like he would’ve played to a huge audience instead of… well, basically no one. 

But after a couple of seconds of silence, he can clearly hear _clapping_ coming from outside, from one storey up. Chanyeol sits very still, listening, and can feel himself basically swelling with happiness. He can only grin stupidly at grumpy Sehun, who barges into the room a moment later, demanding what the hell is the noise so early in the morning. 

 

Later that day, after Chanyeol’s gathered enough courage for couple of hours, he quietly opens their door and slips out, climbing the flights to next storey. He stops in front of the apartment right above his and Sehun’s - number 11 - and squeezes a folded and a bit crumbled piece of paper in his hand. Chanyeol just wants to thank the stranger, as playing the cover for them made him feel so great and happy for some reason. Just slip the paper under the door like they had done and go back in, Chanyeol thinks but can’t quite make himself approach the door. 

Chanyeol would’ve probably stood there for hours, hesitating, hadn’t the very door he was staring at opened suddenly. Chanyeol twitches, completely startled, and is suddenly looking at a boy around his age. The boy, who seems to freeze mid-step, looks equally startled to see Chanyeol just standing there in front of his door. They stare at each other awkwardly a couple of seconds, Chanyeol taking in The Mysterious Neighbor and thinking that he’s nothing like Chanyeol imagined. He’s kind of short, has a delicate, ordinary looking face and light brown hair that falls over his eyes under the white snapback. He’s wearing a plain white shirt under a green flannel one and ripped jeans. He looks like half of the guys in Chanyeol’s university. 

Chanyeol gives him a tentative smile. “Hi. I’m… Chanyeol, from downstairs,” he says and points.

He can see the boy’s eyebrows rising in surprise.

“I just… Um, here,” Chanyeol stammers and instead of trying to find the words just hands the paper to the boy. The other takes it, unfolds and reads. The corners of the boy’s mouth curl upwards and when he raises his eyes at Chanyeol again, he’s smiling. (He has a nice smile.)

“Thank _you_ for the cover, I really liked it. And I would love to hear more sometime. Oh, and I’m Baekhyun.” 

“Nice to meet you.”

Chanyeol smiles widely at the boy, who lives above him, has a cute smile and similar taste in music, thinking that they are reasons good enough for a possible, new friendship.

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by an FB post of my acquaintance (about how she always looped the same music with her neighbor) and [this tumblr post](http://actualmodel.tumblr.com/post/126244502008/one-of-my-neighbours-slipped-this-under-my-door).


End file.
